Monday, July 2, 2012

Album,Donna Summer 1982

Donna Summer is the tenth studio album of American singer Donna Summer, released in 1982.

Back story

Having left Casablanca Records, with whom she had had some of the biggest selling and most popular hits of the disco era in the 1970s, Summer had signed to Geffen Records in 1980 and had continued working with Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, with whom she had written the vast majority of her hits. However, label owner David Geffen had been disappointed with the chart performance of The Wanderer, Summer's debut album for Geffen and rather than release the followup; I'm a Rainbow
which Summer had recorded with Moroder/Bellotte, Geffen had Summer
record a new album with Quincy Jones from whom a production credit -
given Jones' track record particularly his work with Michael Jackson - Geffen felt would guarantee a commercial smash. The resultant Donna Summer
album was the first time the singer had worked with a producer other
than Moroder and Bellotte since 1974 save for the one-off track "Down Deep Inside (Theme from "The Deep")" which was produced by John Barry for the film The Deep.

The album

Since the disco era, Summer's work had covered a variety of musical
genres and this album was no exception. It had quite a strong soul and R&B influence, and featured a couple of gospel-styled tracks, namely "(If It) Hurts Just a Little" and a version of Jon and Vangelis' "State of Independence", which featured an all-star choir. Rock music was also found in the form of the Bruce Springsteen-penned
"Protection"; the track had been planned as a Donna Summer/Bruce
Springsteen duet but that concept was abandoned as unworkable. The album
concluded with Summer's take on the Billy Strayhorntorch standard "Lush Life".
Several very popular songwriters were used on this album. As well as
the aforementioned Springsteen and Vangelis, Quincy Jones himself
contributed to the writing, as did other names such as Rod Temperton, Merria Ross, John Lang, Richard Page, Bill Meyers, Michael Clark, John Bettis, Jon Anderson, David Foster, Steve Lukather, Michael Sembello, Dan Sembello and David Batteau. This made it the largest number of songwriters ever to contribute to a Donna Summer album.
A period of six months elapsed between the first session for the Donna Summer
album and the completion of the tracks. Summer has since stated that
this was one of the hardest albums ever to record - some of the songs
were quite challenging, plus she was pregnant with her daughter Amanda
Grace at the time. It has also been reported that she found producer Quincy Jones to be rather boisterous and controlling and soon after the album's release she opened up to the Los Angeles Times: "Sometimes I feel it's a Quincy Jones album that I sang on".

Impact

The Donna Summer album was released 19 July 1982 with the advance single: "Love Is in Control (Finger on the Trigger)" having been issued six weeks previous. "Love Is in Control..." would peak at #10 on the Billboard Hot 100 in September 1982 when the Donna Summer album would reach #20 in Billboard; the album's subsequent single releases: "State of Independence" and "The Woman in Me", which respectively peaked on the Hot 100 at #41 and #33, failed to increase the album's chart impact.
Ultimately the Donna Summer album would fall short of its goal
to restore its singer to the level of stardom she'd enjoyed in the
1970s: "Love Is in Control..." would have the lowest Hot 100 peak of a
lead single from an album of new material by Donna Summer since 1978 and
the #20 peak of the Donna Summer album evidenced a further drop in popularity from the singer's debut album of the 1980s: The Wanderer, whose #13 peak had disappointed David Geffen to the point where he'd suppressed the I'm a Rainbow followup Summer had prepared with Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte instigating the Quincy Jones-produced Donna Summer album project. Ironically Summer would have her most successful 80's hit with "She Works Hard For The Money" which with its parent album was passed over for release by David Geffen to be released on Mercury Records.
"Love Is in Control..." did represent a considerable comeback for Summer on the R&B charts
with a #4 peak affording the singer her fifth Top 5 R&B hit. Summer
also reached the UK Top 20 with both "Love Is in Control..." and "State
of Independence" with these tracks both reaching the Top Ten in the
Netherlands - at respectively #6 and #1 - where "The Woman in Me"
reached #7.
The aforementioned advance single "Love is In Control..." featured a non-album track on its B-side: "Sometimes Like Butterflies", a song that Summer penned with Bruce Roberts. This song would later be covered by Dusty Springfield, and Summer's original version was included on the CD, A Different Love by Canadian singer, Mark Tara, as a benefit for CANFAR
(Canadians For AIDS Research). Quincy Jones is credited as producer for
this song as well, although the minimalistic approach to this song was
very different from the tracks included on the Donna Summer album.